A developing debate within the growing theoretical literature on men and masculinity concerns the relationship of gender systems to the social formation. Crucially at issue is the question of the autonomy of the gender order. Some, in particular Waters, are of the opinion that change in masculine gender systems historically has been caused exogenously and that, without those external factors, the systems would stably reproduce. 1 For Hochschild, the "motor" of this social change is the economy, particularly and currently, the decline in the purchasing power of the male wage, the decline in the number and proportion of "male" skilled and unskilled jobs, and the rise in "female" jobs in the growing services sector. 2 1 have argued that gender relations themselves are bisected by class relations and vice-versa, and that the salient moment for analysis is the relation between the two. 3